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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23448661">HeartBreakCity</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Curator/pseuds/Curator'>Curator</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Trek: Voyager</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M, Ficlets, Post-Episode: s07e25 Endgame (Star Trek: Voyager), relevant trigger warnings are in notes before ficlets, some lighthearted and some not, some with J/P and some not, that’s the way the canon couple crumbles</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 14:02:07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,346</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23448661</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Curator/pseuds/Curator</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>One of the fun puzzles in writing post-Endgame J/P is figuring out what to do with P/T. These seven ficlets explore ways to “delete the wife” — without killing her — all with titles from Madonna songs because why not?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Kathryn Janeway/Tom Paris</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>86</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>32</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Justify My Love</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>References episode <i>Scientific Method</i>.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Chakotay took the news the best. He let a doctor complete the procedure, then, with extra swagger in his step, strode off to a holodeck where he KOed three opponents without even breaking a sweat. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Kathryn had a tougher time. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Almost four years.” She shook her head. “I understand the cloaked genetic tags and equipment that remained were impossible to detect given the limitations of <em>Voyager’s</em> sickbay, but ...”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Doctor’s pained face silenced her and, after her procedure to remove the last of Alzen’s devices, the captain’s fingertips found her temples and her laugh was a sound of pure joy. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>For their turn, Tom and B'Elanna lay on adjacent biobeds. When the procedures were complete, a ridged forehead and a smooth one turned toward each other. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her eyes narrowed. “You're a pig.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His nose crinkled. “And you’re hostile.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then both their eyes dropped to Miral in her hover stroller.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>How were they supposed to tell their daughter that her parents’ love was a science experiment stopped by Starfleet Medical ten days after she was born?</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Papa Don’t Preach, Part I</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“Pleased to meet you, sir.” B’Elanna stuck out her hand.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Admiral Paris didn’t move. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Tom,” he said. “You never mentioned a few things about your wife.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>Her husband’s arm tightened around B’Elanna’s waist. </span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The admiral counted on his fingers. “Four Parises dead in the Federation-Klingon War, one more killed by Klingon carelessness in the Battle of Narendra III. Two Parises driven mad by what they saw as part of rescue teams after the Khitomer Massacre. One Paris …”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The arm dropped from B’Elanna’s waist.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“Hold on.” B’Elanna fought the urge to rub her forehead — her ridged forehead. “Are you holding me responsible for the actions of all Klingons that impacted the Paris family?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>The admiral focused on his son. “I was so pleased to know you cleaned yourself up, stayed sober, flew a starship farther than anyone in history. I was hoping we could talk about all the ways you’re a credit to the Paris name, all the ways you’ve made me proud. Perhaps over dinner, just the two of us?”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>B’Elanna decided that if Tom said yes, if he didn’t defend her, if he chose the temporary favor of a man who had treated him poorly for most of his life, then she would pack her bags that very night.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>So she did. </span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Take A Bow</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Chakotay and B’Elanna talked about almost everything.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But not once in all their years in prison did they discuss what happened that day in sickbay.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Four-day-old Miral was in a bassinet next to B’Elanna’s biobed. The first wave of crewmembers had been medically cleared to leave <em>Voyager</em> and B’Elanna had heard their excited plans to disembark at McKinley Station.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hadn’t noticed they all were Starfleet crew, not former Maquis.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The Doctor was called to the mess hall to mend a sprained wrist and B’Elanna paced as she waited for Tom. When her head turned, her smile was for her husband. But it was Chakotay, not Tom, striding in.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“The captain said she was hosting a goodbye party for you and Tom and I should be here.” Chakotay glanced around the empty sickbay. “Where is everyone?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>B’Elanna drew in breath to say she didn’t know, but the door opened again. It was a man B’Elanna later learned was Admiral William Ross.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The captain and Tom were behind the admiral, followed by a half-dozen McKinley Station security officers, each shouldering a compression phaser rifle.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Computer, seal sickbay doors,” Admiral Ross barked. “Mr. Chakotay, put your hands where my officers can see them. Ms. Torres, do the same.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>B’Elanna never asked Chakotay if he knew at that moment what was going on. She didn’t. Phasers aimed at her head hummed and her heart hammered as her arms rose. B’Elanna whispered her husband’s name but, when Tom looked at her, his eyes were ice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Admiral Ross faced Chakotay and B’Elanna, his back to his phalanx of officers. “Do you both agree to go quietly, to stand trial for charges of treason against the Federation as members of the illegal, amoral, terrorist group known as the Maquis?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>One of the security officers, a young-looking Bajoran, flinched, chin shaking, phaser waggling.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>B’Elanna could have sworn she heard Chakotay breathe, “Kathryn?” but, of course, B’Elanna never asked him to be sure. The captain’s eyes were icy twins to her helmsman’s.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Chakotay’s jaw flexed.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>B’Elanna would have bet her life that Chakotay had noticed the young-looking Bajoran. Would that officer help them? Could they fight their way out? They’d certainly beaten tougher odds. Maybe they could —</span>
</p><p>
  <span>From the bassinet, Miral sighed in her sleep.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And although no one had touched her, B’Elanna gulped for air like she was being choked, like there was a noose tightening around her neck, not phaser rifles trained on her head, and she somehow found the oxygen to say, “I’ll go if I can take my baby with me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Admiral Ross glanced at Tom and the younger man gave a quick nod.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>B’Elanna walked backwards, her hands still in the air, and she heard it, she heard the exhale from Chakotay that took the fight out of him, forever, but as she gathered Miral into her arms, B’Elanna’s only thought was gratitude. Gratitude for Klingon genetics that left no physical indication of her newborn’s blond, pale father.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Yet, as Miral matured from baby to child to teenager — all in a penal colony in the Eridani system — B’Elanna never asked Chakotay if, on that day in sickbay, he heard the admiral tell the captain and the helmsman, “Your methods were unorthodox, but you certainly succeeded in neutralizing the Maquis threat to <em>Voyager</em>. I can’t say so officially, but there’s sure to be promotions in this for each of you.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>B’Elanna never asked Chakotay if he saw the two chins rise like a goddamn brochure for Starfleet complete with blue eyes and smooth, unmarked foreheads.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And B’Elanna certainly never asked Chakotay if he saw fingers lace, captain and helmsman, as the treasonous Maquis that had been key to <em>Voyager’s</em> survival were escorted out by a flag officer and the blunt ends of compression phaser rifles. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Because Chakotay and B’Elanna talked about almost everything.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But they just couldn’t talk about that.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Hung Up</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Trigger warning: Sexual dysfunction.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>They sat next to each other as the Starfleet counselor called it “The Madonna-Whore Complex” and noted it had been recognized by psychotherapy for hundreds of years. After marriage or childbirth, one partner would begin to perceive the other as a nurturer and therefore no longer desirable.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“And that’s why I can’t ...?” Tom’s sweaty palms dampened his trousers over his knees.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Get it up?” B’Elanna supplied.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>They hadn’t had successful intercourse in the fourteen months since Miral’s birth.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The counselor nodded, then explained a course of treatment that involved identification of feelings, thoughts, and symptoms; self-education on natural sexual desires; healthy fantasizing; plus communication and engagement with the sexual process. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tom stared at the ceiling, blinking rapidly. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>B’Elanna’s nose wrinkled.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“I’m sure you don’t want a sexless marriage or a divorce,” the counselor said. “Treatment in this way can —”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Actually,” B’Elanna’s arms crossed, “I’ll take a divorce. I have enough to do without spending even more time worrying about a flyboy who can’t launch.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And, with that, she stood and walked out.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. Papa Don’t Preach, Part 2</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>“Pleased to meet you, sir.” Tom stuck out his hand.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>John Torres didn’t move. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“B’Elanna,” he said. “You never mentioned a few things about your husband.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His wife’s arm tightened around Tom’s waist. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>The dark-haired human counted on his fingers. “Commodore Shohreh Paris forced the Klingon Empire out of the Archanis sector as part of the Khitomer Accords. In the Klingon Treaty with the Federation, Admiral Michael Paris insisted warbirds be subject to ‘health and safety inspections’ within Federation space — code for search and seizure. Captain Avery Paris …”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The arm dropped from Tom’s waist.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hold on.” Tom fought the urge to rub his forehead — his smooth forehead. “Are you holding me responsible for my ancestors’ actions that impacted Klingons?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The dark-haired man focused on his daughter. “I have a lot of regrets in my life, B’Elanna, but I’ve always been proud to be a student of Klingon culture, to learn the values of an honorable people. I should have stuck around when you were a kid, but we can reconnect now, talk about all the ways we can be there for each other, all the ways I’m proud of you and want to appreciate your heritage with you. Maybe over dinner, just the two of us?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tom decided that if B’Elanna said yes, if she didn’t defend him, if she chose the temporary favor of a man who had treated her poorly for most of her life, then he would pack his bags that very night.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>So he did.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. Secret</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Trigger warning: intimate partner violence.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Tom knew B’Elanna had broken Joe Carey’s nose and punched Vorik in the face. He knew she was prone to idle threats and that her violent thoughts were strong enough to trigger a fight on the Mari homeworld.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>So, the first time she hit him, Tom regenerated his shattered cheekbone and told himself that he should have diffused the argument, that he knew what he was getting into when he started dating B’Elanna.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>It was after he fixed dozens of fractures and bruises, after he became adept at scooping up their infant daughter to save her from her mother’s rages, after a kick in the ribs landed him at Starfleet Medical, that Tom admitted to anyone what had been happening.</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>“You don’t need to live your life this way,” the doctor told Tom. “There’s counseling, there’s separation, there’s divorce.”</span>
</p>
<p>
  <span>And at the word “divorce,” Tom nodded because he couldn’t speak through the tears he had denied himself for so long.</span>
</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Give it 2 Me</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>The banners were everywhere that first year.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Hear the captain of <em>Voyager</em> tell the tale of the miracle ship propelled by Federation principles for 70,000 light years! Starfleet Academy representatives will be on site!”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Enrollment declines in the wake of the Dominion War had been brutal and academy admissions officers had deemed Kathryn Janeway a potential solution to their problems.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It took six months of eight speeches per day for her to be unable to stand in the shower without shaking and for her vocal cord regeneration treatments to fail. The tour wasn’t just retelling, it was reliving the last seven years and it would kill her, she was sure.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>But the captain would die in her boots if that’s what Starfleet wanted. Whether she was on the bridge of a starship or behind a microphone made no difference.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Then her shuttle pilot got lungworms and Kathryn’s self-preservation kicked in. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We need to cancel the remainder of this month’s speaking engagements,” she told Starfleet Command. “Lieutenant Cisneros is too ill to fly.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“We’ll dispatch a replacement,” she was told. “Complete today’s schedule and await further orders.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Eighteen hours later, Tom Paris beamed onto the shuttle. His Starfleet duffel bag fell from his shoulder to the transporter pad. “Are you okay?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Kathryn had been trying to coax vegetable bullion out of the replicator. “Some people say hello.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He reached over her and keyed in the request. “Some people don’t have sunken eyes, sallow skin, and a voice that sounds like your throat abandoned ship.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Her eyebrow didn’t even have the energy to quirk.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He handed her the just-replicated bowl of soup. “Go to your bunk. I’ll point the shuttle toward your next stop.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tom took the two-person vessel to warp, then disabled the engines. Kathryn slept for the entire day it took Tom to “fix a crack in the dilithium intermix chamber,” according to logs he sent Starfleet.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Don’t do that again,” she told him when she emerged from her bunk, eyes steely despite her rosier complexion and stronger voice.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He swiveled in his pilot’s seat. “With all due respect, I don’t take orders from you, and Admiral Patterson promised me a bottle of Draylaxian whiskey if I found a way to give you a break without getting caught.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Of course. The speaking tour was under the command of Admiral Brand — and Brand and Patterson hardly got along.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Unsure whether Tom’s lips were curling upward because of the promised whiskey or her flowy nightgown, Kathryn returned to her bunk.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>That night she beamed back to the shuttle after another fourteen-hour, six-planet, eight-city tour. She sat on her bed and managed to pull off one boot, then the other before tipping backward to rest for just a few minutes, muscles spent, arms and legs splayed. Through the bulkhead, she heard Tom talking to B’Elanna on subspace.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Look, I don’t need your insecurities right now. I’m assigned to this shuttle for at least six months and I’ll see you and Miral when Starfleet says I can, not a minute sooner.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When Tom finished his call, Kathryn commed him, audio-only. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“What was that all about?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She could hear his sigh through the bulkhead and her badge. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“B’Elanna thinks now that we’re back in the Alpha Quadrant that I’m going to dump her for the first good-looking woman to make a pass at me. She says I only care about what’s in front of my face and I wouldn’t have married her if I knew how close we were to getting home and having other options.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Kathryn’s eyelids drifted closed. “Why don’t you set her straight?”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Tom’s voice dropped to a whisper, audible only through the badge. “Because she’s right.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>The eyelids snapped open.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Seven years of near-celibacy. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Six lonely months destroying what was left of her health.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>And now a chance to finally take something for herself, something kind and golden-haired and just the right tinge of naughty. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>Kathryn’s skin tingled and her mouth arced in a lazy grin.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Is your name Zephram Cochrane?” she murmured. </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“No, why?” </span>
</p><p>
  <span>“Because you could initiate first contact with me.”</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She was certain Tom would be familiar with the old pickup line. Sure enough, her door slid open and, for a second, she saw a lazy grin that matched her own. Then lips met, uniforms unfastened, and life on the speaking tour suddenly got a whole lot better.</span>
</p>
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